The COVID-19 emergency and the professional liability of healthcare providers: the situation in Italy

The manuscript concerns the problem connetting to how can the current law on the professional liability of healthcare providers be reconciled with the activities that physicians are substantially forced to do in the emergency to care for COVID-19 patients. The Italian healthcare system is working in catastrophic conditions of urgency. In the face of this dramatic situation, advertisements for “legal studies” have begun appearing in some newspapers and social media outlets, offering free consultations to represent claims for damages against subjects, physicians and healthcare structures involved in caring for COVID-19 patients. Italian healthcare workers, especially those on the front lines assisting COVID-19 patients, have a compelling need for this amendment in order to be able to work serenely without fearing future penal and/or civil suits against them.